Blogging Moms

Daddy Destinations

Mission Statement

This site has no agenda, and its author has no chip on his shoulder. He promises not to whine about "fatherhood equality," and he'll do his best not to sound superior. He is, afterall, just a dad. Instead, he promises to tell good stories about his three kids. That's about it.

When I'm not saving the blogosphere by night, I'm a teacher by day, an occupation that has given me more than I could ever have imagined. I teach 8th grade English, and it seems like whenever I tell someone that -- teachers and non-teachers included -- the listener cringes and makes a comment about what a difficult age that is. My response is always the same: I love this age group, and something fun happens every day.

That's usually true, but today was a bad day. One of my favorite students was arrested for possession of marijuana with intent to sell, something she openly admitted to.

Her name is Dakota, a unique name for a unique girl. In her appearance, style of dress, and taste in music, she is dramatically different from most of her peers. In a school dominated by hip-hop culture, she listens to Morrissey and the Cure; at an age where most students are focused on conforming, she walks a different path. In general, students like Dakota, students who are confident enough to be different, demonstrate a strength of character that typically serves them well in the classroom and beyond.

Unfortunately for Dakota, she won't get that opportunity. When she arrived at school this morning, her backpack was full of weed, some of it already divided into several plastic bags ready for sale, the rest stashed in a package the size of a bag of potato chips. Enough weight that her next stop will probably be juvenile hall, not on-campus suspension.

I convinced the assistant principal to let me talk to Dakota before the police arrived, and when I sat across from her she was shaking with fear. I cannot begin to defend what she was doing (when I asked her why she was doing it, she simply said she was trying to earn some money), but it was impossible not to feel bad for her.

She had been asked to write a statement naming her supplier and intended customers, and she was clearly conflicted. To snitch, or not to snitch? She was desperate to talk to her mother, but scared to death of her reaction. The assistant principal had offered to help her if she cooperated, but she thought he might be lying. As she sat there in that moment, she was sure of only one thing -- no matter what happened, her world was crashing down around her.

It was when she finally asked me what she should do that the true magnitude of the situation dawned upon me. When I looked at Dakota as she awaited my answer, I couldn't help but imagine my own daughter sitting in room like this five years from now.

Understand this: I have seen absolutely nothing in my daughter that would indicate she could ever make a choice like this. I expect that she will be a model citizen and stellar student on her way to changing the world, but isn't that what all parents think? Don't we all assume that it will be someone else's child who will cheat on the exam? Won't it be the neighbor's daughter who sneaks out at night to see an unapproved boyfriend? Won't it be another kid with cigarettes hidden in the bottom of her backpack? We think so, don't we?

But if there's one thing that teaching has taught me it's this: you never know. As much as we shelter and guide and nurture and love, there are variables beyond our control which can completely change the entire equation. And so as I looked at Dakota, I wondered how I would react if my own daughter somehow found herself in a position like this. Would I be patient and understanding, or would my fear and disappointment manifest themselves in anger? I would like to think that I would be as supportive as possible, but I admit that I don't know for sure.

My final words to Dakota as she was being taken to speak with the police were simple. I told her that one day twenty years from now, long after she had put this mistake behind her, she might have a daughter of her own. And if that daughter ever found herself in a spot like this, I hoped she would remember this day and how frightened she was, and then I said goodbye.

I may never see Dakota again, but I won't ever forget the lesson I learned from her today.

I'm fairly certain that I went to school everyday when I was in the second grade, it's just that I have no idea what I did when I was there. I remember some addition and subtraction; I remember that the class was divided into high, middle, and low reading groups; and I remember feeling bad that my best friend was in the low group. Our big math project was counting the seeds in a cherry tomato (tomatoes still make me a little nauseous thirty years later) and I wrote a report on my favorite dinosaur (triceratops) off the top of my head. Homework? Never.

Things have changed.

Alison's in the second grade, Henry's in kindergarten, and both of them have a significant amount of homework every night. Alison usually spends about sixty to ninety minutes, and Henry clocks in at about an hour. (I don't think I was doing that much until at least the fifth or sixth grade.)

Homework usually starts after dinner and bath time, somewhere around seven o'clock, which is probably our first mistake. The thing you have to realize, though, is that Hurricane Kate is swirling in the late afternoon, making conditions less than ideal for concentrating on math facts and identifying patterns. And so we wait.

Once Baby Kate is put to bed and homework gets started, the division of labor is clear. Alison and Henry attend a Spanish language dual immersion school, which is amazing. The problem, though, is that Alison's second grade Spanish has already outdistanced my high school Spanish. Since Leslie is fluent, she's in charge of Alison while I take care of Henry.

Henry's kindergarten homework is really just about learning how to learn, but the secret bonus is that it's also helped us learn how to learn together. Like most five-year-old boys, Henry can be frustrating sometimes. If he's not in the right mood he might scribble all over his paper and start to cry or roll around on the floor and dissolve into laughter, making me sure in either case that he'll one day make an excellent President of the United States.

Recently, though, things have been different. We both still get frustrated, and there are still evenings when the session ends in tears, but those aren't the norm. I'd love to take credit for the transformation, but the truth is that Henry has taught me more than I've taught him.

1. There will always be more homework
If he has trouble repeating a pattern of shapes on Monday night, I can be fairly sure that he'll do fine on Tuesday.2. Tomorrow is another day
If we get a late start and it just make sense to spend another thirty minutes cutting out capital letters from the newspaper, we can always put it off until the next day. The world won't come to an end.3. Stay within the lines
Okay, maybe he didn't teach me this one. Everyone knows that even if you're thinking outside the box, you still need to color within the lines. What he has taught me, though, is that there's a reason why kindergarten teachers ask for everything to be colored. Little boys have trouble with small activities like this, and Henry's no exception. Coloring is good practice.4. Be patient
There's no need to worry if he can't recite the letters of his name in Spanish. He'll do it when he can do it. (And by the way, he can do it!)

The biggest thing that all this homework has done is given me an hour of uninterrupted time with my son every night, no small feat in a family of five. So whether we're deciding if an airplane should be colored purple or red, sorting words by their opening syllables, or discussing the trials and tribulations of Curious George, we're doing it together. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Now that the kids have been back in school for a few weeks, our evenings have gone back to the usual routine: Dinner sometime between 5:30 and six, shower for Alison, bath for Kate, bath for Henry, bed for Kate at seven, homework for Alison and Henry at 7:01, bed by eight for both. It's almost always the same.

Henry is still in pre-school, so his homework consists of coloring and working on his letters. Today he created a family portrait, drawing five happy faces and asking me to label them Mama, Daddy, Alison, Henry, and Baby Kate. Very cute. I'm not sure why, but Alison was the only one with hair.

As difficult as it is to believe, Alison's in the first grade now, so she has homework every night. So far it's been fairly light, just a single worksheet with phonics on one side and math on the other. She breezes through the front, circling pictures that begin with the letter J, for example, and coasts through the back, which is usually a collection of math facts like 5+2.

She finished so quickly tonight that we decided to look at a worksheet from class that she hadn't finished. At first glance it was just more of the same: 4+3, 1+5. Easy. But then we got to the "bonus problem" at the bottom. It went like this:

Lisa is five years old. Adam is three years older than Lisa. Karen is one year younger than Adam. How old is Karen?

Who is this teacher kidding? Is she trying to drive us insane? I understand that the elementary school curriculum has changed a touch in the past thirty years, but this is a bit ridiculous. I think I first came across problems like this when I was in the sixth grade. Here's how the conversation went after we translated the question:

Alison: I don't understand.
Daddy: Okay, how old is Lisa?
Alison: 5.
Daddy: Good! How old is Adam?
Alison: 3.
Daddy: No, Adam is three years older than Lisa. How old is Adam?
Alison: 3.
Daddy (breathing deeply): No, Lisa is five and Adam is older than she is. Three years older.
Alison: (No response)
Daddy: So if Adam is three years older than five, then Adam must be...
Alison: (No response)
Daddy: Okay. Lisa is five years old, right?
Alison: Right!
Daddy: And Adam is three years older than that, right?
Alison: Right!
Daddy: So five plus three is??
Alison: Eight!
Daddy: YES!! So how old is Adam?
Alison: (No response)
Daddy: Adam is eight, okay?
Alison: Okay, Daddy.
Daddy: Adam is eight, and Karen is one year younger than Adam, so how old is Karen?
Alison: Who's Karen?

When I'm not at home playing the role of ShotgunDaddy (a role I play to much acclaim, by the way), I fill my time molding and shaping the minds of the next generation. I teach 8th grade English.

When I meet people for the first time and tell them that I teach middle school, the response is typically one of trepidation. If I were to start telling people that I'm a lion tamer, I think I'd get the same reaction. You do what? Are you alone in the cage? Do you have a weapon?

Here's the secret, though. There's never a day without a funny story. Before I tell you what happened today, a little background. My students are what we like to call "delayed readers." Many of them struggle with the written word, so consequently they hate to read. To combat this, I encourage them to choose their own reading materials for silent reading, hoping that they'll stumble across something that interests them. Most students dread the twenty minutes that I expect them to spend reading quietly, but some have found a groove and actually look forward to the time.

So here's today's story, starring a student that we'll call "Tanya." In many ways, Tanya is a typical eighth grader, at least as defined within our school's demographics. If you remember the eighth grade, you know that schizophrenia is everyday's word of the day. One day Tanya will run into the room bubbling over with excitement about something her friend just told her about a boy that just checked into her first period class, the next day she'll enter in tears because her science teacher called her mother during class, and the day after that she'll spend her time with me trying unsuccessfully to stay awake because she's been up past midnight watching Jerry Springer and re-runs of Cops. As I say, typical stuff.

To her credit, though, Tanya has found a book that she likes, and she's actually been bringing it to class every day. Based on what I've seen of the cover, it looks like some type of a romance novel. Fine with me. (Quick sidebar: You know how blind people can hear whispered conversations on the other side of the 405 at rush hour because one sense takes over for the one that's missing? I don't have the data to back this up, but I've found that many of my low readers compensate in a similar way. What they lack in reading development, they more than make up for in hormonal development. But back to our story.)

As we were wrapping up silent reading this morning, Tanya raised her hand (a big step, by the way) and tossed me a hand grenade.

Tanya: What does r-e-l-u-c-t-a-n-t mean?
Me: Reluctant. It means you don't really want to do something.
Tanya: Okay. What about c-o-n-c-u-b-i-n-e?
Me: Um, excuse me?
Tanya: C-o-n-c-u-b-i-n-e.
Me (scrambling furiously): Well, back in Biblical times, blah, blah, blah...
Tanya: Oh, you mean like 'hos?
Me: Wait a minute. What exactly are you reading?
Tanya (quoting from her book): He was slowly turning all of the young girls on the block into his reluctant concubines as their youthful bodies ripened.

** Cue needle scratching across record. **

What I Thought: Holy Christ I'm glad I have tenure!
What I Said: Okay kids, who wants to talk about those wacky partners, Subjects and Predicates?

Thankfully, most of the class was blissfully unaware of our conversation, and those that were paying attention certainly weren't able to navigate through the vocabulary. Reluctant concubines? Ripening bodies? That's the only problem with teaching middle school -- every class eventually devolves into sex education, like it or not. At least I still have my job.

I haven't used this space to write at all about Hurricane Katrina, but it hasn't been for lack of reaction. It would be impossible not to be affected by the steady stream of stories and images of the tragedy that struck the Gulf Coast last month, and I'm sure I felt the same emotions that most people did.

First there's disbelief followed by the inevitable tinge of guilt as you wonder what it would've been like if it had been your family struggling for survival -- which leads to the only question that matters: what can I do?

For me, the answer was to talk to my students. I teach 8th grade English, but I've always felt like my responsibility to my students extends beyond the state curriculum, so when school started I ditched my usual opening day routine and spent the time talking about the hurricane and showing them pictures of the aftermath. Some knew about what was going on, and some didn't, but they all understood that something had to be done.

In each class the question came before I expected it. What can we do? In each class I pulled a five-gallon Sparkletts bottle from behind my desk and ceremoniously dropped a dollar bill inside. I told them that while I certainly wouldn't miss that dollar, there were families in New Orleans who could make good use of it. I explained how the strength of our country lies in the power of its citizens, and that by allowing our spare change to work together we could help. In one of my classes, a boy stood up while I was still talking and emptied his pockets into the bottle.

For a week and a half my students dropped their coins and dollar bills into the bottle in a display of compassion not always shown by eighth graders. I was touched by the generosity of these students, kids who have grown up in a low socioeconomic area and aren't always aware of what's going on in the world around them, but I wasn't prepared for what happened on Tuesday.

Katherine is a quiet girl who sits near the back of the room and rarely speaks in class. When she came to me on Tuesday morning she was holding her piggy bank. (Technically, it was actually a Pikachu bank.) There was a hole where she had broken it before coming to school, and I could see where she had written herself a warning on the back: "Katherine: Do not spend! Save for laptop!" I'm not sure how long she had been saving, but she told me there was probably at least thirty dollars inside. And then she poured it in the bottle.

A minute later another teacher walked by my room. When I told him about what Katherine had done, he was so moved that he immediately opened up his wallet and took out thirty dollars of his own to match her donation. For the rest of the day I told everyone who would listen about Katherine and what she had done, and the reaction was always the same. Faces glowed and hearts filled with joy. With her selfless gift, Katherine had proved that the act of the donation is often more important than the amount.

The bottle on my desk now holds $128.36. That's probably only enough to take care of a family for a day or two, but I think it means even more than that. It shows us that we are not powerless, and it reminds us that every one of us, even a thirteen-year-old child, is capable of making a difference.